Talk:My Father's Box/@comment-5269370-20140707221823
Hello :) You posted on my Talk Page requesting some feedback on this pasta. Well here it goes! Okay, to start off, I'll have to give this 5.7/10. I'm afraid it's not great, but it's not bad either. I'll explain why. Your opening paragraph is quite good. You introduce the character and the story very well. When you stated that the character was sorting through their mother's stuff, not only had I not expected the mother to have died, but I didn't expect her to have Alzheimer's either. It's unexpected, and makes you interested to read on. You were doing good from here on too, with the whole mystery of the incorrectly dated marriage & birth certs, coupled with both the coloured photos, and the odd, unsettling behaviour from the mother. The way the protagonist describes it, that they didn't know before searching through The Box, that it's something more than Alzheimer's, while the reader does. That's something very special for a writer to achieve. To communicate something to the reader without being blatantly obvious. The scene at the liquor store, is where things started going downhill. This scene actually doesn't start out too badly. It sort of jumps out at you, but that's not a bad thing. However, you then say: "As I look down at my right hand, it starts to fade, as if I can see right through it." - Why does the character suddenly look down at her right hand? Did she feel something there? Did she hear a drip coming from the general direction, look down, and see that her hand is melting? You need more explanation there. "I can no longer feel my right hand... because it is no longer there. A fierce burning sensation is taking over my entire body, a pain that is like no other. I wonder, "is this Hell?" I wonder, "What has my Mother done?" and, "Does this have anything to do with the suspicious documents I just found?" - to put it bluntly, this whole paragraph is terrible compared to the rest of the story. The hand is no longer there, but you can describe that much better than just simply stating that it's literally no longer there. I know you can! And, I can tell you for sure, that if I was in searing pain, and all of my limbs were melting, that those thought would CERTAINLY not be there first things on my mind. "I open my mouth to scream, but I don't think any sound is coming out. I can see hot steam radiating from my body as I collapse to the floor. A dreadful stench is filling the air." - Much better. You have recovered very well from that previous awful paragraph. My advice would be to let this paragraph be an example to yourself at how you should be writing. From here on then, a good quality of writing returns to the story. There's no doubting your talents, as can be seen from parts of this story here. There are things you do need to work on, however. My advice would be this: #Try to be a little less vague about your writing. Being mysterious is fine -in fact it's wonderful- but for your story to keep the interest of the reader, it cannot be vague to the point where it's confusing and lacking in information. #Read over what you have already written, and make sure that there aren't any awkward sentence structures, or paragraphs that take away from the quality of the story. #Some parts of the story seemed a bit rushed, so maybe slow down a little a think through more parts a little more thoroughly. I hope some of my advice hasn't upset you too much, and be aware that I see much potential in your writing. I hope you do bare in mind everything I've said here, and I hope to see more of your writing in the future! :)